Thursday, August 25, 2011

Everyone talks about soups and how they warm you up when you are cold or make you feel better when you are sick. But have you ever thought about our Indian soups, mainly about the yummy rasams we make? They have a even greater effect on how they make

us feel.....

The warmth, the spiciness, the slightly mild tangy flavor....has all the good stuff to really make you feel good!

Whenever we make rasam at home, I usually have a drink of it, just plainly, simply rasam. I love to have it hot and spicy. Rasam is usually made of tamarind pulp or juice but these days making it with fruits and fruit juices has also become common.

I don't mind making it with fruits, but for me it has to be tangy and spicy.

If you have a cough, add some pepper to the rasam. Add ginger if you have a cold.

Add garlic to the tempering if you like smell of it and it never can be bad! :)

We do make our own rasam powder at home, but you are welcome to make rasam with the store bought powder. I will try to soon post homemade rasam powder on my blog!

For the third day of the blogging marathon - Lemon Tomato Rasam.

This Lemon Tomato Rasam doesn't have tamarind in it but instead is made with Lemon and tomatoes to get the tangy flavor. This combined with the spicy rasam powder and tempering is a heartwarming delicious soup which can be not only be eaten with rice but also can be enjoyed in a cup by its own!

Ingredients:

1 lemon, juiced (you can use more, if you require more)

1-2 tomatoes, chopped, depends of how tomatoey you want

water as required 1 - 2 cups

1 tbsp Rasam Powder

Tempering and seasoning:

1/4 tsp Urad dal

1/4 tsp jeera or cumin seeds

1/4 tsp mustard seeds

2-3 dry red chilis, broken

few curry leaves

pinch of turmeric

salt as required

1/2 tbsp oil

coriander leaves for garnish

Method:

Chop tomatoes, add some water and Microwave it for about a minute or two, until the tomatoes are soft and can be squeezed.

Let it cool, before you squeeze it, or it will be hot! :) Just squeeze and make it a pulp.

Add some more water into the tomato pulp and transfer into a stove top pot.

Add the rasam powder and turmeric. bring it to a boil.

Prepare for tempering in a different pan. Heat oil and add the tempering ingredients, one at a time, ending with curry leaves.

Transfer this to the rasam carefully as it will splash around and make noise! :)

Mix in the lemon juice and salt. Let it come to a boil one more time.

Garnish with Coriander leaves.

Serve Hot with rice or enjoy it in a cup.

Enjoy!!!

Check out what the other bloggers are blogging about in this Marathon.